Perkins and Will talks with Shield Lockers about the impact of COVID-19 on sports architecture
What’s waiting for sports venues and athletic facilities on the other side of this pandemic? There’s a lot of speculation and ideas gaining momentum as to where design could or should go once we’ve emerged from this complex crisis.
Shield Lockers recently had a conversation on this topic with Jenna Cruff and Andy Barnard of Perkins and Will, a national leader in sports, recreation, and entertainment architecture. Jenna Cruff, NCIDQ, LEED GA is the Interior Design Director and Andy Barnard, AIA, LEED AP is a principal and Managing Director of the Denver studio.
Shield Lockers has worked with Perkins and Will on one-of-a-kind custom lockers in many collegiate athletic facilities including Northwestern University’s Ryan Fieldhouse, Walter Athletic Center, and the Welsh-Ryan Arena in 2017. We’ve also worked with the firm in other practice areas including a project addressing an interim and emergency housing solution.
Here’s what they have to say about it.
Health and wellness in athletic venues and facilities
Perkins and Will’s overarching design philosophy is Living Design. Living Design transcends a brick-and-mortar design mentality into the bigger picture of a design experience, where core principles of sustainability, resilience, regeneration, inclusion, and well-being come together seamlessly.
With respect to athletics, Cruff says, “We design sports and recreation facilities to support the overall wellness of the athlete, fostering well-being through an emphasis on community, inclusion, and a design ethic focused on healthy buildings for healthy people. At the same time, buildings must be flexible enough to evolve over time, providing adaptive and inclusive spaces that integrate nutrition, academics, athletics, and community building. This includes ensuring excellent durability, cleanability, and maintenance, which is why we look in particular at the lifespan of materials and hardware to ensure they can withstand heavy use, and reconfiguration. We want the positive impacts of our environments to persist as long as possible, contributing to the resilience in our designs.”
The impact of COVID-19 on sports facilities design
“From our perspective, it’s a two-sided coin.” says Barnard. “On one side, how do you react to COVID-19? It has a certain lifespan, but that will end. On the other side, how much influence will it have on the next chapter? We can’t accept that social distancing will be a permanent fix moving forward. It’s our job to create a balance.” Perkins and Will aims to achieve that balance with a strategic focus on resilience and well-being in their design methodology.
According to Barnard and the PW team, building resilience comes in two forms; architectural resilience—building to withstand, but also human resilience—individual and personal empowerment. “Architectural resilience ties into the long-term thinking of design, including adaptability and flexibility of built environments,” says Barnard. “If this occurs again, the idea would be that schools don’t have to completely shut down these facilities. How can they carry on even in a reduced capacity? Human resilience is probably the positive that will be coming out of the current situation. It’s easy for young people to lose sight of the bigger picture. Coming out of this pandemic, I believe there will be more resilience among students—they’ll have a bigger belief that they can pull through these types of situations and even emerge better from it. They’re more sophisticated than they realize.”
In the short term, the focus is on how to adapt operations, maintenance procedures, equipment layouts, and materials to comply with social distancing requirements in order to bring facilities back safely. “We have been talking with and listening to our clients, and are putting together a resource for them that provides guidance on how to address the immediate physical concerns, but we are also addressing the emotional impact of this pandemic,” says Cruff. “Athletic and recreational facilities provide more than just a place for physical fitness, they provide emotional and social connections. We want to help our clients preserve the sense of community and connectedness that they have built.”
“Well-being is especially important at the collegiate level,” says Barnard. “It’s not a job for student athletes, it’s part of their overall responsibilities. If nothing else, Covid-19 will push us in a direction that helps us focus on the individual—each student athlete’s well-being. It’s not just about athletic success while they’re in school. Student-athletes have a full life and career beyond sports, so a bigger focus on academics, nutrition, and mental well-being becomes part of these facilities as well. We’re building a safe, supportive environment for them to work and live for four or five years that fosters well-being and builds resilience. It’s a great recruitment tool.”
“But so much is in the air financially,” continues Barnard. “It’s a little hard for schools to look beyond next year. We’ve got to find a way to come out of this and continue on the way we did before or make the appropriate adaptations for what will become the norm. Smaller schools are in a tough situation because they don’t have the backstop or television revenues that larger schools have. We’re also noticing state-funded schools redirecting funds elsewhere.”
Design trends to come
“Traditional group training and practice regimens were already being replaced by highly tailored, individual training, nutrition, muscle recovery, sports medicine, and rehabilitation programs,” says Cruff. “Basically, each athlete is looked at and analyzed, and a program is designed specifically for them. We believe that Covid-19 and social distancing will accelerate this trajectory, and designs will need to support more one-on-one activities.”
“The challenge with this approach will be preserving social and emotional connectedness,” Cruff continues. “We want people to be able to safely and comfortably use group spaces, such as locker rooms. To do this, we will have to design with durability, cleanability, and adaptability at the forefront. What if social distancing is needed again or, at some level, becomes a standard recommendation? Can we design a locker room that can be reconfigured so it doesn’t have to be completely taken offline? How do we design a space that encourages individuals to take steps to protect themselves and others? What technology and infrastructure is needed to support remote interactions? We are excited to see how we can design to solve some of these problems.”
“It’s evident that the shift from a group-oriented model to an individual-centric model would include a cultural shift in how teams work out, practice, and train,” says Barnard. “This might also add a VR or digital technology component to programs which they’ll have to evaluate in a cost-benefit analysis. This could completely alter how you rebuild architecturally, with certain spaces considered either virtual or not. Smart programs are continually evaluating and finding ways to really adapt and change, and our architecture is going to have to do the same thing.”
“Perhaps the most important thing to remember is that the college experience and the sports experience is a communal experience. The worst thing we can do as designers is forget about that piece of the puzzle. We need to build in ways where staff and students can still feel a sense of community while remaining safe. As we look forward, the most successful athletic programs will continue to build that strong support network around their athletes. They’re still team sports, but everyone has a role, and that will be a bigger focus than anything else.”
”Architecture responds to the needs of our clients and their communities,” says Barnard. “Buildings should be a framework for people to improve their everyday experiences. There’s not a silver bullet in architecture—it’s about tailoring the service of buildings for the way that the community will inhabit them. We won’t see that go away, but that’s what we’ll stick to in terms of serving clients and the people who use our buildings.”
Learn more about Perkins and Will’s Sports, Recreation and Entertainment design expertise.
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